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Rating: 1991 film, written, directed, and starring Woody Allen. The cast is filled with celebrities like Jodie Foster, John Malkovich, Kathie Bates, and John Cusack. The character is a little man (Kleinman, little man in German) awakened in the middle of the night and reluctantly hired as a vigilante. Groups of men divided into fierce gangs roam the city alleys in search of a killer to lynch. Over the course of the night, Kleinman finds himself increasingly entangled in the situation and is forced to take refuge in a circus. The story, or rather the character, resembles Hans Fallada's German novel, which describes the life of the average German in the 1920s. The film is appropriately shot in black and white and can be described as a dark comedy. There are both funny and unsettling twists, with more psychological, philosophical, and social ramifications. Meanwhile, Allen sheds light on the rampant violence and anti-Semitic fear of Central Europe in those years. He does this by mixing tragedy and comedy and setting up a story that immerses the characters in darkness and fog. "Shadows and Fog" is a highly atmospheric film, with a very suggestive style and structure, full of very intense backlights. The dialogues are frenetic and brilliant.
At the beginning, the clown Malkovic says "We are like everyone else. We are artists. Great talent comes with responsibility." It is an Allenian reflection where he thinks that artists consider themselves superior, but sees it more as a matter of vanity and that, in fact, talent is nothing more than a conquest. If essentially you have the gift of talent, you must have the responsibility to manage it. As if you were born rich. In the film, there is another interesting metaphorical line "at night there is a feeling of freedom": Allen thinks of night as a moment of absence of civilization. Closed shops, darkness, lead to viewing the city as a convention imposed by man, and the reality is that we live on a planet that is wild in its nature. And all of civilization protects us and allows us to do "things," but it's nothing more than a convention imposed by man.
The set design can then be interpreted as protection from chaos and isolation of the main character. The mood of the characters is supported by narrow and closed alleys. If in previous films it was the apartment that represented the psychological situation of the character, in "Shadows and Fog" it is the city symbolizing anxiety and entrapment in social conventions.
All the music in the film is by Weill (a German composer who died in 1950, whose music was expressly created for the people) and perfectly suits the oddity and widespread nocturnal hysterics. It's an atmospheric orchestration, precious and fitting period material. An Allen in true form, brilliant in content and performance. When, in the end, he takes refuge in the circus (as an assistant to a magician) and decides to leave everything behind, it will be like expressing a metaphorical response to the violent climate of those years with the weapon of magic and illusion. Really good.
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